Although not technically a farm, I do cultivate flavors in my kitchen. Yum.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Better than a Brownie Biscotti

I have to admit that I was slow to jump on the biscotti train thinking it was a fad. Who would want an over baked cookie? Well, I was dead wrong. These are amazing and definitely better than brownies.Biscottimeans "twice baked" in Italian and the double baking is the secret to making these cookies crunchy. Sometimes I under bake them just a tad so they are crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside. Ahh Heaven! Either way they are delicious.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a baking sheet. Grab a large bowl and with a mixer cream the butter until fluffy. Add sugar and continue beating until it is no longer gritty. (I have yet to accomplish the "beating until not gritty" step so don't worry about it to much.) Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in vanilla. Combine all dry ingredients in another bowl. Slowly add the flour mixture to the egg mixture until incorporated. Stir in the nuts.

At this point you will look in the bowl and see what looks more like a sticky batter than cookie dough and think "How the heck am I going to form logs out of that!?" Here is my secret.

In the bowl divide the batter in half. Take some butter and grease your hands up really well. Scoop one half of the batter up and coax it into a log about 12 inch long and 1 1/2 - 2 inches thick. Lay it on the cookie sheet. Repeat with the 2nd half of the batter but make sure there are at least 3 inches between the logs on the cookie sheet because they will spread. Bake 25-30 minutes. After the first bake let them cool for at least 10 - 20 minutes. If you don't let them cool sufficiently the logs will crumble when you slice them. Using a serrated knife, cut the logs, still on the pan, on the diagonal into 1/2 inch slices. Carefully turn the slices on their sides and return them to the oven to bake another 10 minutes. Let them cool completely. Enjoy dipped in coffee, tea, or dessert wine.